I give some props

The esteemed Tyler Antkowiak has written a short story. There's two or three instances of mild  profanity, so if you feel up to it, read it here. 

Did I mention that it was incredible? Oh yeah . . . so, it's incredible. Wonderful storytelling, and an awesome idea for a story (props for that to Ty's little sister). The way he tells the story, especially at the beginning, makes you identify with the narrator and makes the story much more intense and effective. Enjoy. 

The 100th issueversary- The Anemic Muskrat

Here we are ladies and gentlemen. This is, indeed, a momentous occasion. I have a few words to say (in the form of a fable) in commemoration of our hundredth post. Here goes:

There was once a very scared muskrat. He didn't have any particular reason to be scared, except that a voracious dog was chasing him. The poor anemic thing. That's right, the muskrat is anemic. Is there no justice in the world? Not that we should blame the dog either; he was hungry (and anorexic). When seeing the muskrat the dog couldn't help but defecate. . . uh, I mean salivate. So, the dog was chasing the poor muskrat all around in circles and the muskrat became all lightheaded (because he's anemic) and fainted. Well, this didn't please the dog. He was hungry, but not hungry enough to eat something that had fainted. You see, the dog always did this. He was always making excuses for not eating something. So, he just returned to his own vomit, I mean kennel. The muskrat lived to bleed another day.

Moral: Better look before you read next time. Ha Ha Ha!

What's wrong with this picture?

It's a little hard to make out, but that's Starbursts sitting on Kaleb's plate. He left them sitting there like he was just peeling off shrimp tails.

This, ladies and gentlemen, is how short on food we are. Instead of chips (like normal people) we are eating Starbursts with our grilled turkey sandwiches (or veggie burgers, if you have the enormously good luck of being me).

Why Dane is no longer an author on "Help! I've been Flabbergasted!"

It's not because we don't love Dane (Swede) anymore. On the contrary, we love Dane just as much as ever and we would like to wish him a happy birthday (40 min. late, sorry).

It's just that Dane has his own blog that he posts to, and I felt that we shouldn't pressure him anymore to post on this blog.

That, and I like the original picture of Kaleb and me much better. Brings back memories of us being seniors at Trinitas. So there you go.

I make a promise

Alright folks, it's coming up. Our blog scores the big 1000 hits mark. That's right, people have looked in on this all-too-beautiful page 1000 times. So here's the deal. You scroll to the bottom of the page. If you see a golden 1000 staring back at you (or just a gray one - whatever) take a screen shot of it and email it to me or Rob, or let us know in the comments section. But you'd better have proof! (Or be able to swear on your mother's grave and all such and sundry) 

If you are that lucky person, you have two choices. If you're in Moscow, I will buy you a cookie at Wheatberries. Or a foccacia pizza. Whichever you want. If you're in Pensacola/Milton, I will buy you a doughnut at Milton Bakery come Christmastide. If you fit in neither category: first of all who are you, and second of all, you can ask any of us you would like to write on whatever you would like. 

Should nobody catch the magic 1000 (if somebody gets it and doesn't know, or doesn't let us know) and you see 1001, grab it. The nearest person (after 1000, no 999 business) will get the prize in their stead. Alright people. Watch and wait. And keep hitting that refresh button.

I am, again, amazed

Guys, you didn't forget the Somali pirates did you? The ones who just saw a big ship and stopped it? I didn't think so. Well, there has been a lot of activity in that region recently, and despite the vigilant eyes of the U.S., Russia, a few E.U. ships, and NATO, at least one more large freighter has been seized by other Somali pirates. That being said, what of our original buddies on the good ship MS Faina? How have they lasted out the last month and a half? 

Well, they're still there. Their demand is now 8 million in the coldest and hardest instead of 20 million. Poor guys, it's tough being a pirate these days. People just don't have any respect any more. Sheesh. 

I almost want to pray for these guys to win just because they're so gutsy, but they're Muslims and pirates. So I suppose I'll be praying for their salvation and that they would figure out how exactly they're gonna get out of this one. 

The Dane Ultimatum

This is an ultimatum to Dane (Swede), not a "Dane Ultimatum". If you are reading this (and especially if you are not), please post to the blog in one week or you will be booted off.

Effective: Friday November 7, 2008 12:01 AM PST

I dip my big toe in the dungpit that is the 2008 election

Alright people. Open poll. Put in the comments who you will try to make the most powerful person in the world come November 4 and why.*

If you feel like it, try to convince me to agree with you. I'll be voting in what is arguably the biggest swing state in the country, the Sunshine State of Florida itself. I'm also trying to figure out whether I'm going to write in "No" for President (as the right Reverend Rob Hadding is doing), or "Stephen Colbert" (for reasons that should be easily visible - namely, the sheer beauty of voting for Colbert).

Oh, and if your name is Trey (or even if it isn't), feel free to rant and rave about whom you hate the most in this election. Just attempt to avoid profanity/obscenity as much as possible.

*NB - I don't actually think that the President of the United States is the most powerful man in the world, but he's close enough. Search out your beef with me elsewhere.

Finals at NSA

Finals for the Jerusalem term at NSA are almost over. Pretty soon the only thing we'll have to remember them by is our memories, a few grades, and some wacky pictures. I'm not exactly sure what it is, but it seems like study materials have a tendency to end up in weird places when NSA students use them.

This, ladies and gentlemen is why God made camera phones:

I am Young

I've had these thoughts running through my head for a couple weeks now, and I actually scribbled a little of the last part on the back of my lordship notes. Anyhow, no further adoing. 

Youth

I wonder what it is like to be old and white-whiskered,

For as yet I am young, and wisdom 

Laughs merrily at me from afar as I chase her, 

Ever-stumbling. 

My life is but new-started, 

My days are few, fresh, and hope-full. 

Yet my nights are heavy with thoughts and people and 

Times remembered. 

What will it be to remember even more?

And then my friends not gone away but  

Gone, their laughter forgotten from the world, 

Their song silenced. 

Nevermore, quoth the raven, and nevermore will 

The things I remember exist again, and time 

Will come when no one remembers 

Except me. 

For in remembrance a person lives, somehow, 

And the only true death in this world, as 

The Greek said, was being finally and utterly 

Forgotten. 

The song of our youth will be silenced soon 

Nevermore to be sung again, 

Nor shall there be any who remember the 

Glory of its joy. 

Joy we feel in life, in the blood that 

Pounds in our veins, joy in love, hoped 

And yet unseen. Joy in life yet unlived, joy in  

Joys yet untasted.

And behind it all we wonder, sadly. 

When will it end, when our friends will go, 

When our love will be parted, when our joys are all 

Remembered?

Of a time, I sit and think. 

And when I do, I think mostly tragic thoughts

For life is so here, so present, so much around and in me 

I can’t imagine less before than behind.

Laughing is enough sometimes when thinking of life’s vanity, 

Yet tears seem more appropriate when I 

Think about life, and about death, and how much of 

Each is in each. 

Life is full of death, ours and others and 

Ours in others, and death, we know, is naught 

But renewed, reinvigorated, reborn life 

Age after age. 

And so we cannot but sing, laugh, dance, and drink, 

We cannot but joy in Christ. For we remember, 

Though not with our eyes, when He was us and died, 

When we were Christ (though not yet) and lived. 

Let us feast like lunatics, rejoice like imbeciles, 

Dance like madmen, and love idiotically all the days of our vanity. 

For we are drunk on the wine of life – 

We are young. 

I philosophize

Sadly, this is so, so, so very accurate.

I particularly enjoy the Germans' respective objections to the final goal. Brilliant. Or, as someone in our class would say, "Brilliant, Mr. Python, brilliant."

My polls- A defense

l would like to defend some of my polls, mostly the one about what God would smoke. I think this is a serious theological issue, similar to the one about how many angels could fit on the head of a pin. It may look ridiculous, but look a little closer. Okay, yeah maybe it is ridiculous. But you have to admit that it is funny to reject that God would smoke, because God is a CHRISTIAN!

I gave a great big sigh of relief

The world gets a reprieve! Turns out that yours truly predicted exactly what was going to happen with the old CERN project. Remember? Okay, well, maybe not exactly. But the problem turns out to have been the "hi-tech version of a soldering joint to link the two stretches of cable together." I said it before, I said it now, and I'll say it again. You gotta love it when a multi-billion dollar science-fair project gets sidelined because some random intern or highly skilled welder didn't want to miss his Manchester United game. Well, looks like the good old earth'll be around till 2009.

Animal Rights

"Animal Rights" has always been one of my pet issues, hahahaha. But seriously now, these animals need some rights.

FACT: Animals can't vote

FACT: Animals don't have the right to free speech (suppose, for example, that a parrot tried to say something other than "Polly Want a Cracker?)

FACT: If I were an animal, I'd shoot myself - if only I had the right to bear arms.

This news video, gets at the heart of the issue.

NB: This video is an "Onion" news article. As with many other "Onions" there is some profanity, and some suggestive commercials at the end. The main video is completely harmless but the 20 sec. after it has a few words (or rather one phrase in particular) that aren't nice. Enjoy.


Should Animals Be Doing More For The Animal Rights Movement?

I find this amusing

This is an interesting article on a very interesting story. These dudes in France/Switzerland are about to fire off the most powerful cannon the world has ever seen in order to smash together two particles so small we can't even see them with our most powerful optics in order to find out if something exists which we won't be able to see even if we do find out it exists. And on top of that, 5 minutes of data collecting will give them 50 years of data analysis, at least. Anyhow, that's all well and good, and I'm all about some dark matter (just read some of Augustine's thoughts on Creation and you'll find that he'd go absolutely crazy over this stuff, saying that it proved God), but the response from "skeptics" is what entertains me. The article notes "that some skeptics fear [the experiment] could create micro "black holes" and endanger the planet."
First off, if you think an experiment is going to destroy the frippin' world, does that classify you as a "skeptic," or an "objector on basis of desiring to exist?" I mean honestly, could we get a better description here?
Secondly, micro black holes. Black holes get bigger the more they suck in, and they suck in stars, planets, and galaxies. I'd say this isn't really "endangering the planet" so much as destroying the world. Anytime the world gets turned inside out because of an anti-matter hole somewhere in Europe, we've got problems.

I guess what I'm saying is, I think this cautionary science-talk is absolutely hysterical. And, in the end, it has to be rather nerve-wracking, being a pagan in the middle of all this. After all, we know we aren't going to destroy the planet. They can only hope.

Update: Wouldn't you hate to be this guy and lay part of that track backwards and blow the whole thing up? That whole thought makes me laugh very much. 9.8 billion (that's right, with a b) of the hardest-earned goes up in smoke because some random dude mislaid a 1 foot long magnet.

First Week of NSA

I would like to apologize to my loyal readership for leaving you all in the dark as to how my first week of NSA classes is gone. I can only imagine all the heartache and soul-searching I have subjected you to. I intend to set this straight right now.

I'll start with the academic side first. . . Classes started on Wednesday August 20 but as every NSAer knows, the pain (and fun) begins before classes even start. At the end of convocation all the Professor chaps in their cool robes come up and tell their students what they want them to do for their first class. My class had to prepare for a small Latin vocabulary quiz (DOWN WITH BUSH, I've got political Turrets), read 190 pgs. of "How to Read a Book" (for Thursday), and finish C.S. Lewis' introduction to "On the Incarnation", and the first five books of St. Augustine's "Confessions." This was light compared to what the uppaclassmen [sic] had to do. They like had to answer the question "What is the meaning of life?" with an answer that doesn't involve a number, solve all the issues behind world debt, and cure cancer and AIDS (as long as they're curing cancer they might as well cure AIDS).

Anyway, my point is WE HAD IT EASY!!!

Anyway, I did all that with the help of my compadres who stayed late up into the night with me comforting me that it would "be alright."

Speaking of compadres, I still haven't spoken of any of the wonderful people I have come into contact with in this, my first week of NSA. I can't name them all but let me just tell you that they are wonderful. All the homework does not seem as daunting when I am around people with such good attitudes.

God Bless Us Every One.

and this my friends, is a dead muskrat:

P.S. my apologies to Charles Dickens; that last part just slipped out on its own